


ii-'HSiilj-' 



;t;!::u;i: 



I:!';!':;!!)'! 



■SsDi 





aass F/0 4 



/' 



Davenport Ridge,, 



STAMFORD, CONNECTICUT. 






HISTORICAL SKETCH 



PRINTED FOR PRIVATE USE. 



A. B. DAVENPORT, 

GARFIELD BUILDING, (ROOiM 44), 

BROOKLYN, N.Y. 
1892. 




f \oA 
5?D 





30R1T 1597 DIEl^ .o v 



DAVENPORT RIDGE. 

STAMFORD, CONN. 



HISTORICAL, 



rnHE town of Stamford lies in the sonth western 
-^ part of Connecticut, about thirty- three miles 
from the city of New York, with whicli it lias al- 
most hourly connection by railroad, and also 
daih^ steamboat communication. 

The place was settled in 1641 by people who 
had come from Wethersfield, near Hartford, the 
previous year, bringing their church organization 
with them together with their minister, Rev. 
Richard Denton. This was under the advice of 
the Rev. John Davenport, who with Theophilus 
Eaton had come to New Haven in 1638, and were 
the founders of the New Haven Colony. There 
were twenty-nine heads of families among the 
original Stamford settlers, which number, before 
the end of 1642, was increased .to fifty-nine. 

In 1640, the New Haven settlers sent one of 
their men, Nathaniel Turner, to negotiate with 
the Indians for the purchase of their lands at 
Rippowams (afterwards Stamford). This was be- 
fore the coming of the new settlers. A treaty of 



purchase was made and duly signed by Ponus 
Sagamore of Toquams, and Wascussee Sagamore 
of Shippan, for the purchase of all the lands be- 
longing to both the above-named Sagamores, 
except a piece of land which the said Ponus 
reserved for himself and the rest of said Indians 
to plant on. The price agreed on for the land 
was twelve coats, twelve hoes, twelve hatchets, 
twelve glasses, twelve knives, four kettles, and 
four fathoms of white wampum. 

A confirmatory deed was executed in 1655, by 
said Ponus, and Onax his son, covering all the 
land north of the home lots of the village to six- 
teen miles north, and of the width of eight miles, 
which extended beyond the present limits of 
Connecticut into what is now Westchester Co., 
New York, '' and the above said Indians, Ponus 
and Onax, with all other Indians that be con- 
cerned in it, have surrendered all the said land to 
the town of Stamford, as their proper right, for- 
ever, and the aforesaid Indians have set their 
hands as witnessing the truth hereof, and for and 
in consideration hereof the said town of Stamford 
is to give the said Indians 4 coats, which the 
Indians did accept of, for full satisfaction for the 
aforesaid lands, altho' it was paid before, hereby 
Ponus' posterity is cut off from making any claim 
or having any right to any part of the aforesaid 
land, and do hereb}' surrender and make over for 
us or any of ours forever, unto the Englishmen 
of the town of Stamford and their posterity for- 



ever, the land as it is butted and bounded the 
bounds above-mentioned. The said Ponus, and 
Onax his son, having this day received of Rich- 
ard Law 4 coats acknowledging themselves fully 
satisfied for tlie aforesaid lands. Witness the 
said Indians tlie day and date hereof, Stamford, 

August 15, 1655. 

Ponus. X 

Witnesses : Onax. x 

Wm. Newman. 

Richard Laws." 

The village was located and laid out on a level 
plain, but the parts of the town adjoining the 
village are composed of hills and eminences of 
great beauty, and crowned with fine countr}' 
seats. Back of tliese the land lies in ridges, run- 
ning north and south, such as Long Ridge, High 
Ridge, Davenport Ridge, &c. Some of these rise 
to the height of four or five hundred feet above 
tide water and afford very picturesque views. 

The town is bounded on the nortli by Pound- 
ridge and Bedford, and on the south by Long- 
Island Sound. The towns of New Canaan and 
Darien on the east separate it from Norwalk. 
The two former were formed from the townships 
of Stamford and Norwalk. On the west lies the 
township of Greenwich. The popuhition of the 
town is about 17,000. Although there are quite 
a number of large manufactories here it is rather 
a place of residences for retired merchants and 
active business men of New York, as well as a 



6 



summer resort, for healtli seekers, and those look- 
ing for summer rest and recreation. An active 
business is^ carried on in the village. Besides 
the Congregational there are Episcopal, Baptist, 
Methodist, Universalist and Roman Catholic 
churches. A large number of well-to-do farmers 
are found in the rural districts. 

The second minister of the Stamford Church 
was Rev. John Bishop. After the death of Mr. 
Denton the fame of this young man had reached 
the bereaved church, and two of their members 
were delegated to go to the neighborhood" of Bos- 
ton to see if he could be induced to come and be 
their minister. They found him, and he accepted 
their invitation, and accompanied them on foot 
all the way from Boston, bringing with him under 
his arm his Bible. Mr. Bishop's ministry con- 
tinued twenty-eight years. Another Bible found 
amono- the first settlers belonged to Lt. Francis 
Bell, and is still preserved by his descendants. 
It has an antiquity of nearly three hundred years. 
It contains a record of the first male child born in 
Stamford, Jonathan Bell, son of Francis Bell, in 
September, 1641. From this ancient relic the 
Scriptures were read at the celebration of the two 
hundredth anniversary of the settlement of the 
town, and it will no doubt be brought into similnr 
use at the celebration of the two hundred and 
fiftieth anniversary during the present year, 1892. 
The third minister was the Rev. John Daven- 
port, the grandson of Rev. John Davenport, a 



famous clergyman of London, who was born in 
the nn(;ienr, city of Coventry, England, in 1597, 
and wlio came with a colony of emigrants to 
New Haven in 1(538. 

Mr. Davenport was settled over the Stamford 
Clnirch in 1693, and died in 1731. He was a man 
of commanding influence throughout the State 
and a member of the corporation of Yale College. 
He died in 1731. He had been greatly enriched 
b}^ lands inherited from his grandfather in New 
Haven, and gained by gift or purchase in Stam- 
ford. 

His third son was Colonel Abraham Daven- 
port, of whom Dr. Dwight, in his Travels, Vol. 
III., p. 477, gives the following account : 

''In this town [Stamford], lived the Hon. Abra- 
ham Davenport, for a long time one of the Coun- 
cillors of the State, and before that, of the Colony 
of Connecticut. This gentleman was the son of 
the Rev. John Davenport, and ihe great-grandson 
of the Kev. John Davenport, the father of the 
New Haven Colony. Colonel Davenport was pos- 
sessed of a vigorous understanding and invinci- 
ble firmness of mind of^; integrity and justice, 
unquestioned even b}' his enemies ; of veracity 
exact in a degree, nearly singular ; and of a 
weight of character which for mati}^ years decided 
in this County almost every question to which it 
was lent. He was early a professor of the Chris- 
tian religion ; and adorned its doctrines by an ex- 



etnplary conformity to its precepts. He was oft- 
en styled a rough diamond ; and the appellation 
was, perhaps, never given with more propriety. 
His virtues were all of the masculine kind ; less 
soft, graceful and alluring, than his friends wish- 
ed ; but more extensively productive of real good 
to mankind, than those of almost any man who 
has been distinguished for gentleness of charac- 
ter. It would be happy for this or any other 
country, if the magistrate should execute its laws 
with the exactness for which he was distinguish- 
ed. Colonel Davenport acquired property with 
diligence, and preserved it with frugality ; and 
hence was b}^ many persons supposed to regard 
it with an improper attachment. This, however, 
was a very erroneous opinion. Of what was mere- 
ly ornamental, he was, I think, too regardless ; 
but the poor found nowhere a more liberal bene- 
factor, nor the stranger a more hospitable host. 
I say this from personal knowledge, acquired by 
a long continued and intimate acquaintance with 
him and his family. AVhile the war had its prin- 
cipal seat in the State of New York, he took the 
entire superintendence of the sick soldiers who 
were returning home ; filled his own houses with 
them ; and devoted to their relief his own time, 
and that of his family ; while he provided else- 
where the best accommodations for such as he 
could not receive. In a season when an expecta- 
tion of approaching scarcity had raised the price 
of bread-corn to an enormous height, he not only 




ir»*- ?•"»' 




.X 



c/^6y^ ^ ccoe-M./ju> t<^ 



i) 

sold the produce of his own farms to the poor at 
the former customary price, but bought corn ex- 
tensively, and sold this also, as he had sold his 
own. His alms w^ere at the same time rarely ri- 
valled in their extent. 

" One instance of Colonel Davenport's firm- 
ness deserves to be mentioned. The 19th of May, 
1780, was a remarkably dark day. Candles were 
lighted in many houses ; the birds were silent 
and disappeared ; the fowls retired to roost. The 
Legislature of Connec'ticut was then in session at 
Hartford. A very general opinion prevailed that 
the day of Judgment was at hand. The House of 
Representatives being unable to transact their 
business, adjoiirned. A proposal to adjourn the 
Council was under consideration. When the 
opinion of Colonel Davenport was asked, he an- 
swered, 'I am against an adjcmrnment. The day 
of Judgment is either approaching, or it is not. 
If it is not, there is no cause for an adjournment : 
if it is, I choose to be found doing my duty. I 
wish therefore that candles may be brought.'" 

This incident, so characteristic of this noble 
man, has been pleasingly rendered in verse by 
John Greenleaf Whittier, and is copied, by his 
permission, from "The Tent on the Beach," pp. 
98-102 : 



10 



ABRAHAM DAVENPORT. 

In the old days (a custom laid aside 

AVitli breeches and cocked hats) the people sent 

Their wisest men to make the public laws. 

And so from a brown homestead, where the Sound 

Drinks the small tribute of the Mianas, 

Waved over by the woods of Rippowams, 

And hallowed by pure lives and tranquil deaths, 

Stamford sen: u]) to the councils of the State 

Wisdom and grace in Abraham Davenport. 

'Twas on a May-day of the far old year 
Seventeen hundred eighty, that there fell 
Over the bloom and sweet life of the Spring, 
Over the fresh earth and the heaven of noon, 
A horror of great darkness, like the night 
In day of which the Norland sagas tell,— 
The Twilight of the Gods. The low-hung sky 
Was black with ominous clouds, save where its rim 
Was fringed with a dull glow, like that which 

climbs 
The crater's sides from the red hell below. 
Birds ceased to sing, and all the barn-yard fowls 
Roosted ; the cattle at the pasture bars 
Lowed, and looked homeward ; bats on leathern 

wings 
Flitted abroad ; the sounds of labor died ; 
Men prayed, and women wept ; all ears grew 

sharp 
To hear the doom-blast of the trumpet shatter 



11 

The black sky, that the dl-eadful face of Christ 
Miglit look from the rent-clouds, not as he looked 
A loving guest at Bethany, but stern 
As Justice and inexorable Law, 

Meanwhile in the old State-House, dim as 
ghosts, 
Sat the lawgivers of Connecticut, 
Trembling beneath their legislative robes. 
'^ It is tlie Lord's Great Day ! Let us adjoiirn," 
Some said ; and then, as if with one accord, 
All eyes were turned to Abraham Davenport. 
He rose, slow cleaving with his steady voice 
Tli(^ intolerable hush. " This well may be 
The Day of Judgment which the world awaits ; 
But be it so or not, I only know 
My present duty, and my Lord's command 
To occupy till he come. So at the post 
Where he hath set me in his providence, 
I choose, for one, to meet him face to face, — 
No faithless servant frightened from my task, 
But ready when the Lord of the harvest calls ; 
And therefore, with all reverence, I would say. 
Let God do his work, we will see to ours. 
Bring in the candles." And they brought them in. 

Then by the flaring lights the Speaker read. 
Albeit with husky voice and shaking hands. 
An act to amend an act to regulate 
The shad and alewive fisheries. Whereupon 
Wisely and well spake Abraham Davenport, 
Straight to the question, with no figures of speech 



12 

Save the ten Arab signs, yet not without 

The shrewd dry humor natural to the man : 

His awe-struck colleagues listening all the while, 

Between the pauses of liis argument, 

To hear the thunder of the wrath of God 

Break from the hollow trumpet of the cloud. 

And there he stands in memor}^ to this day, 
Erect, self-poised, a rugged face, half seen 
Against the background of unnatural dark, 
A witness to the ages as they pass, 
That simple duty hath no place for fear. 

The eldest son of tlie Stamford minister was 
John Davenport, born January 2d, 1698, and 
married by his father to Sarah Bishop, Septem- 
ber 6th, 1722. He moved to what was then, and 
is still, known by the name of "DAVENPORT 
RIDGE," a beautiful Pisgah site about five miles 
north by east from what is now the centre of 
Stamford village, upon lands conveyed to him 
by the will of his father. This .will was dated 
January 20, 1729. 

" Item. — I give and bequeath to my loving and 
eldest son, John, two parts of said equal parts of 
my dividable estate, and over and above that I 
give said son the sum of tliirt3^-one pounds and 
ten shillings. Also my mind is that said John 
have my land on Davenport Ridge so called, as 
may appear by the note of laying out and seized 
to me, signed by Deacon Samuel Hoit [Hoyt], 
Stephen Bishop and John Holly, and extending 




C «H 



IS 

to Ponasses Path (now called Poniis Street), and 
the house and barn thereon ; further, my mean- 
ing is that the said house and barn be appraised 
according to their value at the said time of ap- 
praising, only I would have all my land im- 
proved by my son John, by the plough or for 
pasture, and inclosed, to be to my said son John, 
to him, his heirs and assigns forever." 

In Huntington's History of Stamford, appears 
the following account of this site, pp. 481-2. 

"This structure occupies a most commanding 
view from the west slope of Davenport Ridge. It 
is about five miles, north by east, from the Stam- 
ford Depot. The panorama stretching around it 
is, at any season of the year, well wortli a study, 
and in summer is very beautiful. 

"This locality was voted to the Rev. John Da- 
venport, of Stamford, by the proprietors of the 
town, in January, 1705-6, in consideration of his 
hundred pounds interest in the ' Long Lots,' as 
agreed upon at the time of his settlement here in 
1693. By his will, January 20, 1728, he gave it to 
his eldest son, John, who occupied the house upon 
it, and died there in 1742. He was one of the 
original members of the Congregational Church, 
formed in the parish of Canaan by members from 
the Norwalk and Stamford churches, June, 1733. 
The township of New Canaan was not organized 
till 1802. The j)roperty passed next into the 
hands of the third John, who died in 1756, leaving 
it to the fourth John, a deacon in the North Stam- 



14 

ford Church, who died in 1842. A portion of the 
land was bought of the heirs by Amzi B. Daven- 
port, a grandson of this deacon John, and on it he 
built the residence represented in our cut. It oc- 
cupies the site of an old residence removed about 
eighty years ago." A few rods to the north-east 
stands the dwelling formerl}^ occupied b}^ his 
grandfather, who erected it with his own hands 
in 1775. Davenport Ridge has an elevation of 
about 400 feet above tide-water, with a view of 
Long Island Sound for a distance of forty miles. 
From this point are seen the spires and turrets of 
fifteen churches, in the towns of Stamford, Green- 
wich, New Canaan, Weston, Greenfield Hill, with 
the shores of Long Island on the south, and the 
hills of Westchester County, N.Y., on the north. 

The present mansion was erected in 1868-5. 
It contains twenty rooms, viz.: one large parlor, 
one large sitting room, a small bedroom, library, 
(extending two stories), dining room, kitchen, 
laundry, and milk room ; second storj^, eight 
sleeping rooms and bath room, and three bed- 
rooms in the attic. 

The "Old Homestead" contains ten rooms, 
and is in a condition to last fifty years longer. 

There are three barns upon the place, with 
stable and carriage houses, also four wells of 
good water. Distance from railroad station. New 
Canaan, three miles, Springdale, two and a half 
miles, and Stamford, five miles. 

It is a rare occurrence that land secured from 



15 

the Indians by the first settk^rs of a town, and 
conveyed by them to a single individual, should 
liave remained in that family without alienation 
for nearly two hundred years. Six generations 
liave successively owned this native seat. 



DAVENPORT RIDGK. 

On sunset ridge my lady sleeps. 

As nightly sweeps 

The shadow-throng from out the east, 

All hushing — man and bird and beast — 

And stars of night 

Begin to light 

The gems of that far canopy, 

The great, blue, upper-world of sky, 

I think their million rays have wrought 

Some secret entrance to her thought, 

And through it shining. 

Each night refining. 

Make her so like the light that doth endure. 

So fresh, so dear, so bright, so true, so pure ! 

Even as the heavens seem to gently bend 

These homestead acres to their skyey trend. 

Curving the fields up to a swelling dome. 

Lifting to Eden-views the human home. 

So, too, that vault of blue 

Invites and moulds more true. 

Like to itself, as if it were a part. 

Her own unchanging, strong, transparent heart. 

On sunset ridge there shines a light. 

In day or night 

1 shall not look for it in vain ; 

Love's beacon braves the wind and rain. 



16 



Nor is there dark 

Can dim that mark 

To one storm-driven, homeward bark. 

How love can beautify the ground ! 

Or make the solemn heavens around, 

Or hills, or trees, or murmuring sea. 

All seem a part of home, of thee ! 

The sweet, good mother, 

And sire, and brother, 

And she the friend and sister, sister-friend, 

All borrow from the light that thou dost lend. 

O long and often may their footsteps tend 

Up to those fields where precious memories sleep, 

Up to those halls where sons and daughters keep 

Old faith, old love, old hope in man's career, 

Like old wine, in stout hearts, for others' cheer ! 

Long may the hill-top light salute the town 

With bright reminder of its old renown ! 

Long may its sons and daughters sleep and wake 

While beauteous suns shall daily set or break 

On sunset ridge. . 

To M. V. D. C. H. C. 

(Ponus Street, Oct., 1891). 



DAVEr^pORT Ridge 



STAMFORD. CONNECTICUT. 



HISTORICAL SKETCH 



PRINTED FOR PRIVATE USE. 
A. B. DAVENPORT, 

(i.ARPlKI.U BUILUINC, (ROOM 44), 

HKOOKLYN, N.Y. 
1892. 



